hat no man knoweth "whence it cometh." That is to
say, where it originates. It comes right over the mountains from the
West, but when one crosses the ridge he does not find any of it on the
other side! It probably is manufactured on the mountain-top for the
occasion, and starts from there. It is a pretty regular wind, in the
summer time. Its office hours are from two in the afternoon till two the
next morning; and anybody venturing abroad during those twelve hours
needs to allow for the wind or he will bring up a mile or two to leeward
of the point he is aiming at. And yet the first complaint a Washoe
visitor to San Francisco makes, is that the sea winds blow so, there!
There is a good deal of human nature in that.

We found the state palace of the Governor of Nevada Territory to consist
of a white frame one-story house with two small rooms in it and a
stanchion supported shed in front--for grandeur--it compelled the respect
of the citizen and inspired the Indians with awe. The newly arrived
Chief and Associate Justices of the Territory, and other machinery of the
government, were domiciled with less splendor. They were boarding around
privately, and had their offices in their bedrooms.

The Secretary and I took quarters in the "ranch" of a worthy French lady
by the name of Bridget O'Flannigan, a camp follower of his Excellency the
Governor. She had known him in his prosperity as commander-in-chief of
the Metropolitan Police of New York, and she would not desert him in his
adversity as Governor of Nevada.

Our room was on the lower floor, facing the plaza, and when we had got
our bed, a small table, two chairs, the government fire-proof safe, and
the Unabridged Dictionary into it, there was still room enough left for a
visitor--may be two, but not without straining the walls. But the walls
could stand it--at least the partitions could, for they consisted simply
of one thickness of white "cotton domestic" stretched from corner to
corner of the room. This was the rule in Carson--any other kind of
partition was the rare exception. And if you stood in a dark room and
your neighbors in the next had lights, the shadows on your canvas told
queer secrets sometimes! Very often these partitions were made of old
flour sacks basted together; and then the difference between the common
herd and the aristocracy was, that the common herd had unornamented
sacks, while the walls of the aristocrat were overpowering with
rud